Diagnosis Day

20th October 2000 began in a haze. It was the morning after our departmental cheese and wine and I had somewhat overdone it with the liquid part of that pairing. In part this was down to worry as I had spent that thursday afternoon in my GP's surgery getting blood taken to investigate why I had been getting persistent, massive bruises. One on my arm had lasted for about a fortnight and the one on my thigh was still hanging around nearly three weeks later. It was a result of my knee regularly hitting the steering column of a go-kart weeks before. When I look back to that event I also remember that after my second stint on the kart I couldn't stop shaking and was violently sick.

So all things considered I knew there was something wrong and simply wanted a good night out with my friends before I got the results and that's what happened. It was a tremendous night - really fantastic fun that completely took my mind off the worries that had developed since first seeing my doctor about it all.

I had taken the day off so was still lying in bed with a quite stunning hangover when I heard a rather vigorous chap at the door. My room was at the front of the house so I went to the window to see who it was and got a bit of a shock to see my GP standing there telling me he had my phone number wrong and had to come round to see me.

You can imagine this set alarm bells going instantly.

I went down and let him in but he didn't really explain much. He simply said there had been some irregularities with my blood tests and that I had to go up to the local hospital's haematology ward instantly. I let him go back to work and set about organising a lift up to the hospital.

I phoned my mate John, who had left his phone at home, so I phoned my lab to try and get someone to run upstairs to get him. This was the moment that one of our Chinese research students who had very, very minimal English decided would be his moment to answer the lab phone for the first time. After a particularly stressful few minutes of trying to explain what was going on I managed to get Xavi on the line and he sent my supervisor Colin up to find John and to get him to come round to my place.

While waiting on John I took the opportunity to pack a few things and to phone my dad to let him know what was going on. I didn't know much so it was just to let him know I was going up to the hospital really. After that I found myself sitting on my bed absolutely shot with worry so I phoned the person I trusted the most in the whole world to calm me down a bit, my ex girlfriend Sam. We had split up earlier that year, mostly due to my moving away to the other end of the country really, but had remained very good friends. We spoke almost every day but she had been away that week so I hadn't heard from her and she was a bit surprised at me calling during the day. She did a tremendous job of calming me down and left me in a much better state for my journey up to the hospital. I mention this especially because after John picked me up and we got in the car to go up my phone went and it was my best friend Dave calling to ask what the hell was going on. It seems that while she was incredible at calming me down she wasn't so good at staying that way herself afterwards and had phoned him in tears to tell him about it. That was my first incident of seeing how I might get physical symptoms but whatever was happening to me was going to affect all the people I care about.

When I arrived at the correct ward my name and date of birth were written on a paper towel on the reception desk. I don't know why I took this as being a particularly bad sign but it seemed terribly meaningful at the time. A lovely Scottish nurse admitted me and notified the consultant that I had arrived and told me he would be through to see me shortly.

I sent John away but told him I'd need him (and his housemate Rich who I also worked with) to come back up later as I was pretty sure this wasn't a night for me sitting alone, and my family are 500 miles away so couldn't be there.

Soon after Andy Gorringe arrived in and slowly, methodically explained that I had Chronic Myeloid Leukaemia and what that entailed. At the time I was convinced I understood everything that he had said but when the time came to have to recant that information to my family and friends I found that a tiny percentage of it had actually gone in. The only thing that had really stuck was a word that hadn't even been used - Cancer.

I got a hold of some reading material on the correct type of leukaemia and the associated treatments so I could explain it to everyone. I say everyone, but that isn't really accurate. I spoke to my mum and dad, but because this was all happening on my brother in law Peter's birthday they decided to just let the whole family go out on their friday night out before telling them what was going on on Saturday. I did however have to phone Sam and Dave to give them an update. Sam went into internet overdrive and set about downloading anything she could find on the subject whilst Dave set about defusing my worry - this he achieved by referring to it as the biggest attention seeking trick I have ever played. This provided a most welcome laugh - my first of the day.

John and Rich came up and I talked it all through with them and with each telling I got a better hold of the story and came to relax a little more into my situation.

In retrospect I now know there are many differing responses to such a diagnosis and mine fits within the realm of pragmatic. There has never been any 'why me?' moments and nor have I ever really considered that it was something that was going to kill me. I simply wondered what we had to do to fix it.

That wasn't something that could be sorted quickly though. A full assessment of my situation had to be done first. To start with all my bruising (and the bleeding gums, and general lethargy I had been feeling for months) were caused by the massive excess of white blood cells. This disparity had to be resolved and a confirmation of diagnosis had to be undertaken before treatments could be discussed. My diagnosis had been on the basis of my blood films but a confirmation could only be achieved by taking a sample of bone marrow, which would be done a few days later. There really was no doubt about it though, this was a matter of formalities.

So that night, after phoning the friends who did know and speaking to the family who knew and sending Rich and John home I relaxed and went to sleep fairly rapidly. I did lie there wondering what two of my old friends from school Joe and Joanne were doing as it was also their birthdays but I didn't fret too much about my own situation.

I had a vague feeling there had been something wrong for a while; nothing as momentous as this admittedly, but finding out what it was and that there were lots of options gave me an odd feeling of relief and I then had one of the best nights sleep I had managed in months.